Declining the Spring or, Making Fun of Schulz

Abstract

The RPG game. The textual paragraph game. The gamebook. The very names of these genres suggest their literary origin. No wonder, since many of them, particularly the RPG games, derive from the classics of fantasy (Middle Earth based on Tolkien’s fiction), s-f (Cyberpunk 2020, largely inspired by the novels of William Gibson and Philip K. Dick) or gothic horror (The Call of Cthulhu based on H.P. Lovecraft). That select company has been recently joined by Bałwochwał by Mariusz Pisarski and Marcin Bylak, inspired by the short stories of Bruno Schulz.